Hey, You, Get Off of My Cloud!

I hate to sound like I’m the center of the universe but I can’t shake this feeling that everybody wants a piece of me.

I have this gross pit in my stomach from karmic toxicity that’s flying in my direction. (Or possibly I’m a self-absorbed asshole with an inflated sense of importance.)

Whether the former co-worker who would like to watch me die a slow death, my sister who is angrily trying to get some attention or my former boss who has the audacity to walk his dogs while I’m walking in the park, (He winked at me. Gross.) I can’t seem to shake enemies, real and imagined.

My Sister:

I stopped communicating with my sister not long after she got out of prison. From that first post-release phone call when she yelled at me through the phone, called her daughter a bitch and complained that her family had abandoned her, she’s been volatile. When she moved back home, the rest of us tried to spend time with her. But she was aggressive and dismissive. Pleading and crying one minute and yelling and accusing the next. She treated me like shit which was hard to take after the support I gave her during her incarceration. After a few attempts, I didn’t want to be around her anymore. So I stopped being around her, exercising that most basic of human rights: the ability to chose who you surround yourself with.

The tipping point was when all four of us had attempted an intervention. We suspected she was using again and we were worried about our Dad. As soon as she saw us drive up she grabbed her purse and ran to a neighbor’s house, refusing to speak to us. The night before I had been the one preaching compassion and understanding. When I realized she had bolted, I was livid.

She’s tried to get back in. A phone call now and then. An offer to meet. But the offers came in angrily phrased, you-should-want-to-spend-time-with-me kind of messages. It’s my own fault, I guess. As a teenager, I jumped at any chance to spent time with her. I idolized her. She thinks I’m still that girl. “I can come to Lafayette if you want to see your sister, ” she texted me a couple of days ago. I didn’t know how to answer that.

“If you’re in Lafayette, let me know and maybe we can meet,” I replied.

My lack of unabashed enthusiasm spurned a aggressive tirade. I wanted to text back, “Well, now that you’re angry with me, I really want to see you.” I ignored her texts instead.

Then yesterday she texted, “Are you free for dinner tonight?”

“Fuck! I have say yes,” I thought.

I agreed to meet her at 5pm downtown. I was a nervous wreck. My stomach was in knots. I didn’t know what play she was going to go with. I thought she might lay it all out and ask, “Why don’t you want to spend time with me?” Which I would have to reply with the truth. That meant a confrontation. Or, she would pretend nothing was wrong. That would be infuriating.

It was option B. She made small talk and asked how I was doing. I admitted morsels without giving away too much. She complained about Dad, complained about her boyfriend and talked about herself most of the time. It was really awkward. I nodded and gave short replies. I could tell she was trying but she slipped back into her aggressiveness at times and I would just nodd and say, “ok.” She hinted at our estrangement without directly addressing it. She told a story about our sister saying,”But at least she communicates with me. So I’m grateful for that.” I just nodded and said, “That’s great.” The hour passed and I said I had to go.

I know she wants back in. But I’m not even sure why. I think she just wants to say that she’s close the sister she used to be closed to. Any relationship with her has always been a bit one-sided. She was great to have around to party with. She could be very nuturing. But she was always a bit like a hurricane. The first winds are fun and the waves are high but after the eye passes through there’s destruction all around you. Our entire adult life, we knew each other only through short visits. Vacations and holidays. This is the first time she is permanently amongst us. It’s not a coincidence that once in our realm, she’s burned her sibling bridges. Maybe she’s always been this way and I’m the one who’s changed. I don’t know.

I just know that I can’t handle anymore hurricanes. I’m not that strong.

The Blog-Reader

My ex-co worker has had it out for me since she read the few lines referencing her in one of my blogs. (I didn’t name her. But of course she knew it was her.) This chic really hates me. Upon reading my rantings, she copied and pasted the paragraph and sent it to my co-workers. On the day I was let go, she found out immediately. (Lafayette’s a small town.) She texted me hateful messages, saying I had it coming and bringing up the blog. I told her that if she had wanted to discuss the blog or our time together (which had been very difficult) I would have. But she didn’t approach me. She told others about it instead. I told her I wasn’t going to engage with her and asked her to stop texting.

A week or so later she sent me an e-mail. A long e-mail, chronicling all the ways I am a horrible person. My actions had consequences she wrote. She’s right. I have felt the sting of that consequence. I published my feelings online and they hurt someone.

She called me a coward for being anonymous. She’s right about that too. I said so in my About page. I am way too chicken to publish this nonsense openly.

She told me I had pushed her buttons and tormented her everyday that we worked together. Of course, that’s how I felt about her. I did confront her often and try to talk things through when I thought she was being aggressive or unreasonably angry or illogical. “Can we take a walk?” was a tool I used often and I would question why she said such and such or what the problem really was or what she was really mad about. I guess that’s what she meant by pushing her buttons. The truth is, I liked her at first. She was cute and quirky and funny. But then she was angry all the time. When that anger became directed at me it was intolerable. I didn’t want her to be unhappy. I hoped that she would find a way to be happier. So when I knew she had read what I wrote, I knew that I had contributed to her anger. I haven’t gotten over it. Apparently neither has she.

The rest of her commentary was based on reading, what I can only guess is every, single one of my blogs. She commented on my attitude towards my ex-husband, my sister, my bosses. She must have read every last one of them. Wow. She’s my biggest fan. She’s probably reading this right now. I changed the name and password-protected the archives but my ego wouldn’t let me keep it unpublished. There’s just something about the idea of putting it out there, even if it is through the mask of anonymity. There doesn’t seem to be a point if it’s not being shared. And it’s not very hard to find. A few knowing key word searches and here you are.

I thought about writing back to her. I thought about apoligizing. I wrote drafts of responses. Then I would read the draft and realize it wasn’t going to make a difference. There is nothing I can say to her to take away the fact that I hurt her. There’s nothing I can say to take her hate or anger away either. I don’t need to be right. I don’t need to prove anything. She can have the righteousness. She can have her hate, she can tell the whole town what a piece of shit she thinks I am. She can feel justified. I just want to be rid of the nagging grossness that I feel, knowing that she’s out there, hating me. Just as she’s the only one who overcome her anger, I’m the only one who can find an end to the left-over-Catholic idea that there’s a sin on my soul.

The other night I was upset about the way my sister had talked to me and I was on the phone with my little brother as I biked to Pamplona. I was thrown off. I felt like a walking piece of glass. I entered, looking for my friend and there sitting at the end of the bar was the blog-reader. My heart rate went up and I started saying under my breath, “no…no…..no.no…..no…no.no.no…,” and walked right through the restaurant and out the back entrance in the alley way, still saying, “no….no.no.no…..no,” as the waiter taking a smoke break looked at me like I was crazy. I found an ounce of courage and went back in. I found my friend and placed myself with my back to the blog-reader. I never turned around. I thought I had been ready to see her in public but I forgot how intimidating she is. I’m afraid of her. I was afraid of her when we worked together. She brought me to tears on more than one occasion. I wasn’t the only one. I managed to stand my ground, the way an armadillo stands his ground by curling up into a ball, until my friend and I left to go the Moon. You want to talk about being a coward? I felt like a piece of chicken shit.

All of these little confrontations are getting to me and I don’t know how to fix it. (I’m just waiting for some stress-filled contact from my ex. It seems inevitable) I want to dip myself in holy water. I want to see a spiritual healer in a dingy back room full of incense and have mumbling magic words chanted over me. I want to shed a layer of skin or shave my head. No wonder I’m feeling the urge to get on a plane and fly into a war zone. No one hates me there. Somehow the idea of being in an environment filled with two populations who have hated each other for centuries is less frightening than facing an ex-co-worker or my sister.

Maybe if I go see the mummified hand of Mary Magdalene, I’ll feel better.